Stinde in Simla

There’s nothing better than finding a cheeky marginal doodle or two, and that’s what we found when we picked up an otherwise nondescript copy of Julius Stinde’s Buchholzens in Italien at a recent fair.

First published anonymously in Berlin in 1883, Stinde’s satirical travel novel arose out of an 1881 trip through Italy, and pokes fun at the archetypal German abroad. The reading public not only took the jab in its stride, but with zeal, and Stinde’s novel went through many editions, and gave rise to a number of sequels, before the turn of the century.

Our copy has some fab drawings by (who we presume to be) Walter G. Young of Marburg / Calcutta / Simla / Brussels, who signed the half-title. Young was evidently a traveller himself, and a polyglot: on the verso of the same leaf, he translates the same phrase into German, Italian, English, Spanish, Russian, and French: ‘Kindly remove fingers off the pencil drawings, if on them!’ We have complied.

Even the title page sports a faux Indian imprint, written in Young’s best imitation of printed type:

For more info on this travelling travel book, check out our latest list of miscellany here.